Online shopping isn’t showing any signs of slowing down with August 2020 reported as the biggest month in Australian online shopping history, new data from Australia Post has revealed.

The number of online purchases was up 8.9% when compared to the 2019 pre-Christmas peak (the 31 days to 18 December 2019) and 5.8% higher than April 2020, the previous largest period.

In August, the stand-out performers were food and liquor, health and beauty, as well as home and garden products, all increasing 90% or more year-on-year.

Victoria is leading the way with online shopping growing 170% year-on-year, in comparison to a growth rate of 85% across the country. In July and August alone, more than one third of total Australian online purchases were made in Victoria.

Australia Post executive general manager for community and consumer, Nicole Sheffield said Victoria had become Australia’s online shopping capital, home to the country’s five top online shopping locations in August – Point Cook, Cranbourne, Hoppers Crossing, Craigieburn and Doreen.

“Suburbs like Craigieburn and Doreen in the outer-north made the top five list for the first time last month, but what’s even more interesting is that in 2019, just four Victorian postcodes made it into Australia’s top 10 online shopping locations; Victorian postcodes now hold six of those spots for the six months to August this year,” Sheffield said.

The other four spots were filled by Liverpool (NSW) in fifth position, Toowoomba (QLD) in sixth, Rouse Hill (NSW) coming in as eighth and Gosford (NSW) rounding out the top 10.

More Australians are turning to online shopping with the pandemic not only prompting seasoned shoppers to continue but encouraging many households to try online for the first time.

“Between March and August this year over 8.1 million households have shopped online, an increase of 16% when compared to the same time last year; and almost a million of these households had never shopped online before,” Sheffield said.

“In April we saw the biggest influx of new shoppers with over 200,000 new households entering the market. In the five months that have followed, over two-thirds (67%) of these households have continued to shop online, with a quarter of them shopping twice or more per month on average.”

Online shopping continues to boom with growth for the second week of September up 79% nationally and 145% in Victoria.